Sunrise over Balsamroot Flowers Rowena Crest, Oregon Portland, Oregon would be my top choice I had to move to a different city in the US. I’ve visited a number of times for both fun and photography and the beauty in the Columbia River Gorge just blows me away. Most of my photography trips have been waterfall centric and I was excited to return with Willie to spend most of our time photographing wildflowers. The entire west coast had an extremely dry winter and we knew we had to arrive early in the season to catch the flowers. Unfortunately, the dry winter combined with windy days caused most of the blooming wildflowers to lose their beauty before we even arrived. While the lupines, with their short petals were OK, the beautiful yellow Balsamroot’s were mostly withered and falling apart. Willie and I spent a long time scouting this wildflower field at Rowena Crest for signs of a few patches of beautiful flowers. At one point Willie went off to my right and spotted our first patch of beautiful flowers. I spent the next 30 minutes searching and searching but only came across dying flowers. Almost defeated, I returned to Willie, where he pointed out this patch of 2 healthy flowers. This is one of those instances where it was great to have a shooting partner to keep my head up high and help the morning end with a smile on both our faces! Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8: 22mm, f/5, 1/800 sec, ISO 640 Several photo focus blend
The Aurora Dances Over Mountains Vatnajökull, Iceland I've been to Iceland three times now and every trip has been absolutely amazing. My first trip was during the summer and we saw more waterfalls and beautiful scenes than I could possible count. I drove around the entire island and saw as much as I could, but some things that I had wanted to see in Iceland just weren't possible in the summer. I had to go back in the winter if I wanted to see ice-caves and the northern lights! So go back I did ... with Willie, Alan and Rebecca. We spent 10 days at the end of February and early March exploring Iceland in the winter. During the trip we were treated to 2 (and a half) beautiful nights of northern lights! On our first night the sky was crystal clear and the 4 of us saw the lights for the very first time. None of us wanted to go to bed because we were so mesmerized! We had spent a good portion of the day scouting locations for photographing the aurora and as soon as we finished dinner we raced to this spot. We learned what people mean when they say that the lights "danced" across the sky. At one point the lights twisted and turned into the shape of a heart - love was definitely in the air! Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8: 32mm, f/2.8, 4.0 sec, ISO 800
Sunset over the Painted Hills Tuba City, Arizona Of all the places I’ve traveled for photography my most common destination is the Southwest. In particular Northern Arizona and Southern Utah. There’s something about the beautiful red rock, the way the wind has carved the sandstone or formed gigantic hoodoo’s, the giant vistas and the stunning monsoonal sunsets. My first southwest trip in 2014 took Willie and I all over Northern Arizona. We started out on the southern border of Utah, explored the area around Page, and eventually made our way to Tuba City and the Painted Hills. It was our second night shooting this location and Willie and I had high hopes that the monsoon clouds would stick around for our sunset shoot — something they had not done the night before. We arrived early and noticed a stunning section of rolling hills: layers of various red rock with small mountains in the background. The clouds were perfectly aligned, if only they’d stay put. When the clouds burst into reds and oranges we both knew we were witnessing something special. After photographing the scene we both ran off in different directions, hoping to find another composition before the sky faded. I found this curve in the silstone and knew it would make a great photo. By the time I got Willie’s attention the color in the clouds had already begun to fade. This is a cloud I’ll never forget! Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8: 17mm, f/14, 4.0 sec, ISO 100
